


Evil Without Degree

by newmrsdewinter



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Angst, Blood and Violence, Hurt No Comfort, M/M, any route but CF
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-03
Updated: 2020-02-03
Packaged: 2021-02-28 04:14:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 593
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22537597
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/newmrsdewinter/pseuds/newmrsdewinter
Summary: Ferdinand bears the consequences of his father's treachery. Hubert doesn't help much.
Relationships: Ferdinand von Aegir/Hubert von Vestra
Comments: 20
Kudos: 109
Collections: Those Who Drabble in the Dark





	Evil Without Degree

**Author's Note:**

> drabble prompt! this week, it's "goodbyes" and my thoughts immediately went to hell 😊

There is a human heart nailed to the door of the smoking ruins of Ferdinand's estate, and he swears it’s still beating. 

"It's not mine," says Hubert bitterly, wiping the bloodied dagger upon his trousers. "But it might as well be." 

The brutal efficiency with which Hubert and his cronies seized von Aegir property should have paralyzed Ferdinand with fear. Walking through his ancestral home in a daze, anyone would have been horrified to see the fields razed, the beautiful peach orchards reduced to cinders, and the tenant farmers scattered and slaughtered where they stood. 

But Ferdinand knows that these are Hubert’s true colors. Colors that run deeper than the crimson of the Adrestian flag and blacker than the armor of the soldiers who swore fealty to it. For a year, Ferdinand had turned a blind eye to who Hubert truly was behind the charm, power, and wit. And now he paid the price for his foolishness. 

“No prior warning,” Ferdinand says tonelessly. His stomach lurches; he almost trips over the mangled torso of a servant he once knew. “None at all from you or Edelgard. I had to read a _missive_ about what happened to my father. Hubert, what were —” 

“Don’t play coy,” Hubert snarls. “Your father was a traitor who —” 

“I _didn’t_ know!” Ferdinand cries wildly. “Don’t punish me for the sins of my father, Hubert, sins I knew _nothing_ about —” 

“You know what I serve.” Hubert’s voice cracks. “I had no choice in the matter.” 

Ferdinand laughs, shuddering and hysterical. What a martyr Hubert makes himself out to be, to think that he is the only one suffering the consequences of the depravity he wrought in Edelgard’s name.

“You’re lying.” Ferdinand takes one measured step forward. “You could have chosen to warn me before you seized von Aegir territory. You could have chosen not to slaughter innocents. You could have —” 

Hubert’s face contorts as jabs a finger at the corpses strewn motionless on the ground. “Damn your eyes! Why can’t you see that this is the lesser evil? This bloody path is —” 

“You could have chosen me! Hubert, you could have chosen life, and you could have chosen _me_!” 

The loathsome expression on Hubert’s face hardens into something cold. “Her Majesty is offering you a chance to reclaim your house’s glory." He thrusts a leather folio into Ferdinand's chest. "She won't be so merciful again." 

Ferdinand lets the folio fall to the ground. “So this was all a test. A test of my loyalty.” 

"Take it how you will. For all your repulsive moralizing, now the choice is yours, _Prime Minister_." 

There’s something desperate to Hubert’s tone, almost pleading. _Don’t say goodbye to me like this. Please._ He had taken the most intimate parts of Ferdinand’s heart and crafted them into arrows which hit their mark, and yet he still expected Ferdinand to understand that the life he lost was worth this gruesome path to the future.

The bleeding heart nailed to the door beats in tune with the pulse roaring in Ferdinand’s ears. “If this is what your lesser evil looks like,” he says, his eyes sweeping across smoldering ruins of his childhood home, “I want no part in it.” 

Hubert catches Ferdinand by the elbow before he turns. His nails bite into his arm. The air around them turns thin, crackling with dark magic. “Disobeying a direct order from your emperor? No one walks away unscathed.” 

Ferdinand stares at him for a long beat, lost in the anger and despair in Hubert’s cold eyes. 

“I’ll be the first.” 

**Author's Note:**

> EDIT: OH MY GOD I cannot believe I forgot to thank my betas. Thank you, thank you to [Arihime](https://archiveofourown.org/users/arihime/pseuds/arihime) and [Haley](https://archiveofourown.org/users/blarfshnorgull) for their feedback! Please read and enjoy their works too.


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